Visions of Sugarplums
by CamsthiSky
Summary: See, it happens like this. Everything's normal for them all—or, well. As normal as a family full of vigilantes can get. Things are running smoothly. He keeps his head up and his ears open, though, because he may be able to move forward, but he isn't stupid enough to think that he's not going to hit a bump in the road. He always hits a bump in the road. He just hadn't expected this.


**Thanks to wearetakingthehobbitstogallifrey for donating! You're wonderful! And kind of dedicated to laquilasse . Forecast says war is on the horizon.**

 **Good luck.**

* * *

See, it happens like this.

Everything's normal for them all—or, well. As normal as a family full of vigilantes can get. But things are running smoothly. Almost _too_ smoothly, Dick thinks at one point, but he decides to take what he can get while he can still get it. He takes the lack of rogues and prison break outs in Gotham all in stride, and spends his time patrolling Blüdhaven, stopping muggings and rapes and murders before they can happen, and the world doesn't have that dark, dingy tone to it he's come to expect.

Hell, it even looks _brighter_. Which. That just doesn't happen.

So Dick takes it in stride and keeps moving forward, like he always does. He keeps his head up and his ears open, though, because he may be able to move forward, but he isn't stupid enough to think that he's not going to hit a bump in the road.

He _always_ hits a bump in the road. It's how his life seems to work. He's come to expect it at this point, this calm before the storm. Because, just as there's always a bump in the road, there's always a storm.

And, of course, it hits. Dick had expected it to.

He just hadn't expected _this._

His life goes from smooth flying to turbulence in two seconds flat. One moment he's stopping a mugging, the next, the world freezes. _Dick_ freezes. Because in front of him, impossibly, is Damian. A sword sticking out of his chest, blood bright red and staining the ground as his younger brother takes a step towards him. A younger brother who should be with the Titans right now, and not here. In Blüdhaven. A brother who should be alive, not struck in the same place that killed him before.

Dick blinks, and Damian's gone. The mugger has run away. The woman has called the police. Sirens wail in the air, every second he stands there staring at empty air a second that brings them closer. And Dick—he finally manages to pull out his grapple gun.

He barely makes it to the rooftop, the image of Damian with a _sword_ in his chest still burning behind his eyes.

Dick doesn't sleep that night.

* * *

So, it starts with Damian.

It continues with Damian, too.

And eventually, Dick's seeing his little brother _everywhere_ —stabbed, beaten, poisoned, and one scary incident where Damian's limbs are twisted to the point where they remind Dick too much of a night that sent him to live with Bruce and eventually lead to the creation of Robin.

Dick stops sleeping.

And then he sees Damian on patrol again, and he's close enough to touch, this time. Dick's Nightwing right now, and he's pretty sure the warehouse he's standing on top of is the base of operations for a drug lord he's been after for _weeks,_ but Damian's standing in front of his entrance, taking step after step after step closer to him.

Dick flinches when Damian touches him.

Except, it _can't_ be Damian. Damian's not here. He's in San Francisco. Dick had just talked to him last night. There's no snark to this kid standing in front of him. No sass, no scoff, no pride to hide his huge heart. Just cold and silence and death.

It's not Damian.

But there's a hand reaching up to cup Dick's cheek, another hand gripping his wrist, and Dick _flinches_ , because he can feel the cool fingers against his own warm skin, and he shivers, because he remembers a time he held his baby brother's cold body, and this is far too similar.

"You're not real," Dick whispers.

Damian—Not Damian— _whoever_ it is, doesn't speak. The cold turns into burning, and Dick pulls away. He stumbles back a step, arms curling around his chest as he tries to put distance himself from whatever's happening to him.

Dick stops patrolling, too.

* * *

Bruce answers the phone on the first ring. "Speak fast."

Dick barely hesitates. "I—"

A cacophony of shouting and objects being thrown explodes from Bruce's side of the line, effectively cutting Dick off, and Dick thinks that that noise sounds like one of Tim and Damian's fights. It's a pretty big one, too by the sound of it.

Bruce's voice is muffled, and there's a sharp command—an order—and then Dick can hear a few mutters from Tim and Damian, but there's this rush in Dick's ears at the sound of Damian's voice, and it has Dick freezing, some sort of terrifying band tightening around his chest and _squeezing,_ until Dick has no air left and he feels like he'll pass out from lack of oxygen.

Panicking, Dick realizes. He's panicking. He should stop that. Stop panicking. It's only Damian's voice, and if _this_ is his reaction to just hearing it after all those times only seeing his little brother, then he's already lost. He's screwed.

Bruce is back. He's managed to stop the fight in its track, apparently.

"This better be urgent," Bruce says, his voice flat. He sounds busy.

"No," Dick says, and—for the first time that Dick can remember—he hangs up first.

He doesn't answer any of Bruce's calls after that. He sits on the cold bathroom floor, his phone vibrating every few minutes against the tiles, and he's unable to recall just when and how he got there. Eventually, Bruce stops calling.

* * *

Dick doesn't know what to do after that. He briefly entertains the idea of going to Jason, or maybe even Tim, but both of them have too much on their plate as it is. Tim has just come back to them and Dick's not ready to drop new problems onto his shoulders, because Tim will shoulder them, and he'll probably shoulder them without complaint.

Jason is busy, too, and there seems to be a limit to how much of Bruce's brood Jason can seem to handle. Dick doesn't want to push, especially not when he feels like he's about to fall apart at the seams

He's slowly unraveling. Damian's appearing everywhere he looks. He can barely take a step without running into the cold imitation of his little brother, and he's having trouble breathing, his eyes flicking down to the sword—sword, it's always a sword now, never anything else, just a reminder of all Dick's mistakes—and Dick has to look away. Ignore it. It's not real.

At least, that's what he tells himself.

He's running himself into the ground, though. He spends most of his time avoiding the silent, piercing stare, trying desperately to find some kind of footing as he tries to keep going about his life. But he doesn't sleep. He can barely stomach any food, his stomach flipping over and over and over and _over,_ until he feels nauseous to the point of being almost sick. He goes outside for fresh air, only to find himself just running, like running will solve any of his problems.

And he doesn't patrol. Blüdhaven suffers for it. Dick isn't in the best state of mind to worry about Blüdhaven, though. He's a little preoccupied with the fact that he can't even _think_ about his little brother without thinking of the cold image that's always stare straight into him. And on patrol, it always seems so much worse, to the point where Dick starts to mess up, and when Dick goes out, the image always seems look a step closer to _real._

Blüdhaven suffers, yes, but so does Dick. He doesn't know how to help either.

* * *

So that's how it starts. And how it continues. And this, well. This is how it ends.

Dick is human, it turns out, because the Not Sleeping thing that he's trying out doesn't quite work out for him. He accidentally falls asleep watching some trash tv. He's on the couch, dozing, his head tipped back, and he's _exhausted._ He's on guard at every moment of every day, and it wears him out.

So yes, Dick falls asleep.

He wakes up to a gentle touch, and at first, when he opens his eyes and sees familiar dark eyes, Dick's first reaction is to lean into the touch.

It's unlike Damian to initiate contact, but there were times when Dick was still Batman where Dick would wear himself out to the point of exhaustion, and Damian would find him slumped over on the couch or in the arm chair, too tired to stagger the rest of the way to his bedroom. Damian would wake him up with a simple touch to his cheek and then insult him until Dick got up and stumbled the rest of the way to his bed. There was always fondness and concern in those dark eyes, though.

The insults don't come, the dark eyes are cold, and Dick freezes.

This isn't Damian.

Cold fingers dig into the flesh of Dick's cheek, but Dick can't _move._ There's a familiar face—but so, _so_ different—hovering just above his, their noses so close that they're almost touching. Dick's trapped, stuck inside something from his nightmares.

Except, his nightmares have come to life. They came to life a week ago, when he first saw the ghost of his little brother.

And then. Then the image of his little brother—the one that's not so much of an image anymore, the one with a sword sticking out of his chest—opens its mouth, and it screams.

Dick can't breathe. The screaming doesn't stop for a long, _long_ time, and Dick sits there and just _listens._

* * *

For the first time in a week, Dick's alone.

His head is a complete and utter mess.

The scream had lasted minutes, and by the time the image's mouth had snapped shut, Dick's brain had been thoroughly scrambled, and right now, Dick's having a hard time getting a handle on what's real and what's _not._

The image is gone, and the scream seemed to have done _something_ to make it go away. Maybe it completed its job of driving Dick completely over the edge, or whatever. But it's gone, but Dick's skin feels electric. There's something humming underneath it, and with every turn, he expects to see his dead brother.

His dead brother that's still alive. Damian's alive, he reminds himself. He's with Bruce. Or the Teen Titans. He's not here. Even though he _was_ dead, he isn't now, and that has to count for something. Damian's alive.

Alive, alive, _alive._

Dick feels like he's barely holding onto his sanity.

He somehow ends up on the bathroom floor again, his phone in his hand as he stares at it. Whatever happens now, nothing can be worse than having his dead brother—no. The _image_ of his dead brother. He can't get that mixed up. Alive, alive, _alive—_ hovering over him, touching his check, and screaming until he goes insane.

He's almost there. He's close.

He doesn't want to be close. He wants to be back in his right mind, where everything made sense and he wasn't questioning his surroundings every few seconds.

He ends up calling Bruce, and again, Bruce picks up on the first ring.

"Dick," Bruce says, something almost relieved in his voice.

Dick can't find it in him to say anything.

"…Dick?" Bruce says again, but there's a questioning tone to it, faltering, maybe, if it were anybody else. But this is Bruce, and Dick isn't sure Bruce knows what faltering is when it comes to anybody besides Jason. "If you don't answer, I'm tracking your phone and coming to get you."

"I think I'm going insane." It comes out in a rush, and Dick thinks that maybe he's crying, because his face feels, but he can't for the life of him remember when he started.

Bruce is silent for a moment, two, three, and then—

"I'm coming. Stay where you are."

Bruce hangs up. Dick stares at his phone, and tears run down his face. He stays where he is on the bathroom floor.

* * *

At first, Dick thinks that Bruce is an image, too.

But when Bruce crouches down in front of him less than an hour later, Dick just stares at him. He thinks if this were any other time, he'd reach out to his dad, wrap his arms around Bruce's middle and let Bruce just hold him, but something stops him.

"Dick," Bruce says.

It's with a gentle voice that Dick only hears when he's on the edge of unconsciousness or death, and Dick's face crumples the moment his name hits the air. He collapses forward, and Bruce catches him. His chest is warm and intact. A hand runs through his hair, and another wraps around his back and pulls Dick closer.

The image never spoke. This is Bruce. This is his dad.

It's weird seeing someone who isn't dead, who isn't just a part of Dick's mind, who isn't some fucked up part of Dick's imagination. Someone who doesn't burn his skin with ice cold hands. Someone who doesn't stare into Dick's very being with dark, lifeless eyes. Someone that doesn't have a sword sticking out of their chest.

Someone that's real.

"I keep seeing him," Dick says, never closing his eyes, even as he presses his face into Bruce's button up shirt. If he closes his eyes, the image will come back.

"Keep seeing who?"

"Damian." His voice is barely a whisper, but the name sends a shiver down his spine, and Bruce holds him ever closer when Dick threatens to shake apart. "I keep seeing him, and it doesn't make sense, because Damian's alive, right? Damian's alive?"

"Damian's alive," Bruce confirms. He sounds like that crinkle in between his eyebrows is back. Stressed. Impossibly sad. And Dick had brought it back. "He's at the manor right now."

"He was screaming," Dick says, and his chest hitches on a breath. "And he was dead. A sword in his chest. He was dead, Bruce."

"We're going back to home," Bruce says.

And Dick can't remember how to argue, how to say _no, no, no, that's where Damian is, I don't want to see that anymore, I don't want to be reminded of what I did to my little brother,_ so when Bruce helps him to his feet, Dick clings to him. Follows him out the bathroom door, out the apartment door, down the stairs, and into the car parked out front.

And that's that.

* * *

Or that _should_ be that, but it's never that simple, because the moment Bruce parks in the garage, Dick looks into the mirror on the passenger side of the car and—it's the image. Cold lifeless eyes, sword sticking out of his chest, and Dick's sure that if those fingers were to touch his skin, they would burn.

Dick stops breathing, and he can't take his eyes off of the image in the mirror.

"Dick?" Bruce asks, and Dick can feel his stare. "What's wrong?"

Dick doesn't answer. He stares. The image steps closer, opens its mouth, and it screams. Dick slams his hands over his ears, and his breath comes in short pants. Bruce doesn't hear it, because he's leaning over to Dick's side of the car to tug at Dick's wrists, but Dick can't move.

"It's not real," Bruce murmurs.

But Dick can barely hear him, too focused on his current problem. The kid he killed is still screaming his lungs out. Dick wonders if this is all the pain that Damian felt when he died. Dick hadn't seen the blow happen, but getting skewered isn't painless, and leaving his family is even less.

The screams must be what Damian had felt when he'd died.

"Damian's not dead," Bruce says, his voice a touch harder. "Dick, look at me. _Look at me."_

Dick doesn't look. Bruce's warm hands force his face away from the mirror, and the screaming stops. Dick's left panting for breath, sweat clinging to his forehead. There's something _seriously_ wrong with him, and he stares at Bruce's wide eyes for almost a full fifteen seconds before Bruce speaks again.

"It's not real," Bruce tells him. "Whatever you're seeing, it's not real."

"Damian," Dick tries, the name coming out barely louder than a whisper on a whistle of breath. "Damian keeps—"

Dick cuts himself off. Bruce's hands—they cup his cheeks, just like Damian's did hours ago, but Bruce's hands are warm and calloused, and they ground Dick in a way Damian's had left him cold and aching.

Except, they weren't Damian's hands. Because Damian's alive, and the hands on his face before were dead. Damian's _alive._

But Bruce's hands frame his face, and Bruce's thumb runs underneath his eye, and it's so _real_ , that Dick has no choice but to keep his attention on his dad.

"What's wrong with me?" Dick croaks. Tears are running down his face again. Bruce wipes them away as they come.

"I don't know," Bruce tells him truthfully. "But we're going to figure this out, okay?"

Dick can't help but believe him.

* * *

Damian's at the manor.

And the thing is, when Dick steps into the cave and sees Tim and Damian arguing over something on the computer screen, he freezes. His breath hitches, and he thinks that maybe this is just another image. That maybe there's something wrong.

He waits for the sword to appear in Damian's chest. For the dark eyes to swivel his way, cold and lifeless and filled with blame. It's his fault. It's Dick's fault, and when that doesn't happen, when Damian turns towards him and honest to god _scowls_ , Dick sobs.

The Cave goes silent. Both Tim and Damian stare at him, and it's Bruce that moves, and all Bruce does is press a warm hand to Dick's back. Dick wants to curl up in his dad's arms and fall apart, but— _Damian's right in front of him._

"You're alive," Dick whispers, and it's almost inaudible, but his family seems to hear it anyways.

Damian's expression is bewildered, almost frightened, and Dick sees him look between Dick and Bruce for a few seconds, seemingly at a loss of what to do. There's warmth in his eyes. There's life in his movements. It's Damian.

It's his little brother.

Dick's knees give out underneath him, and it's only because Damian and Bruce are both quick to catch him that Dick doesn't face plant. But that's Damian's hand on his arm, holding him up, and Dick throws himself forward, curling his arms around Damian and bringing him impossibly close. He can feel Damian's heartbeat, feel Damian's breath on his neck, and feel the warmth of his skin.

Alive, alive, _alive._ Damian's alive.

Dick squeezes his eye shut and he sobs into his little brother's hair.

After a long moment, Damian brings his hands up to wrap around Dick's waist, and they just hold each other.

Dick keeps his eyes closed. He knows if he opens them, the image will be there, but he has Damian in his arms, and that's enough. Damian's alive.

* * *

It starts, continues, and ends with Damian.

It also, apparently, starts with fear toxin that no one is sure how Dick was exposed to. It continues with the fear toxin making Dick see Damian dead. And it ends with the fear toxin overwhelming his brain, and Dick thinks that if he hadn't called Bruce for help, he might have died from exposure.

He curses himself for hanging up the first time.

The antidote, unfortunately, takes a long time to fully take effect. Dick holds Damian in his arms the entire time. He keeps his eyes closed. And eventually, Bruce directs them both to lie on a cot in the medbay.

Dick doesn't argue and, surprisingly, neither does Damian. Dick eventually falls into a restless sleep.

* * *

When Dick wakes up, the world doesn't seem so dark and gray. It's not bright and sunny, sure, but it's clearer, and there's something to be said for that when Dick's world has been murky water for the past week. It's refreshing, and a weight's been lifted off of Dick's shoulders. One he hadn't even known was there.

Damian's still in his arms, sleeping softly, and Tim's nowhere to be found. Bruce, though, is working on a laptop in a chair next to the cot, bags under his eyes, looking a lot more tired than Dick last remembers. He wonders if that's just because he'd been so whammied by the fear toxin he hadn't noticed or if it's _because_ of the fear toxin. The waiting.

Maybe it's both.

"Hey," Dick says softly.

Bruce looks up, face softening minutely. "Hey."

"Thanks for coming."

"Always," Bruce promises.

Dick knows it's true, but he can't bring himself to do much more than give Bruce a shaky smile. The world is clearer, but it doesn't mean he doesn't remember what he had seen. What he'd been thinking. He remembers everything.

Especially the screaming. Especially Bruce's hands.

"I was really scared," Dick tells him. "I thought I was losing my mind."

"It was just the fear toxin, Dick."

"Yeah." Dick sighs and stares up at the endless cavern above him. "Yeah, but it _felt_ real. I thought I was going to have to stare at—at Damian forever. That it was never going to go away. It was _awful."_

Dick chokes on the last word.

Bruce doesn't say anything to that. He usually doesn't. But he does close his laptop, lean forward, and brush the hair away from Dick's forehead. "Go to sleep, Dick. Damian isn't going anywhere."

"Right," Dick says, taking a deep breath. Damian shifts, and Dick rubs a hand up and down his back. He doesn't wake up. Speaking of little brothers, though—

"Where'd Tim go?" Dick wonders.

"He went back home," Bruce sighs. "He said he was going to give you two some space."

Dick hums, but he's starting to feel sleepy again with Bruce smoothing his hair back, and Damian tucked into his side, and the antidote running through his veins fighting against the toxin. He'll have to have a talk with Tim—and soon—but for now, Dick closes his eyes, and he's not afraid to sleep.

* * *

See, it starts with Dick, alone in Blüdhaven. It continues with Dick losing his mind. And it ends with Dick and Damian and Bruce.

It happens like this. And Dick, well. He endures. Just like he always does. Nothing's solved, not really, but his little brother is here. His dad is here. He thinks that for now, it's enough.


End file.
